Amazing reduction in Spam

[Miss Betsy]

If there were an international body that legislated internet conduct and business practicess, treaties between countries and regions can develop enforcement policies across borders that would make the laws more effective and uniform and far reaching. The real problem we are facing now are countries as China and the like which become heaven for Internet Crime, precisely because there is no international norm of conduct.

The problem with legislation is that it can be used for censorship. And it is not only China that is irresponsible, but Comcast and others who do not do anything about the trojans on their networks.

The problem is money. Upstream providers don't experience problems with spam; they just benefit from the increased use of bandwidth. Bandwidth isn't expensive enough to make it cost effective for providers to use resources to find and shut down spam sources - especially hiring people who can tactfully instruct end users as to the problems and effective solutions.

It has been suggested that some sort of licensing - on the order of ham radio licenses - be used. However, it would have to be like blocklists - voluntary participation, and might not work much better than the various 'trusted' server schemes.

Habeus tried incorporating a copyrighted haiku in the headers so that they could sue whoever used the headers for spam.

And, in order for legislation to be effective, there has to be enforcement. It costs a lot of money to track down and prosecute violators. Most of the real criminal spam already is covered by legislation which is used to prosecute those who are caught.

The beauty of the Internet is the freedom to communicate with whomever you want to - and the logical way to not communicate with those whom you don't want to is to block. That way no one is 'forced' to do anything, if there is a glitch with a false positive, then the *sender* who is the only one who can fix the problem is notified.

The only reason that spam continues to be a problem is that not enough end users are demanding good service. They put up with losing email due to false positives being caught in content filters and with having to whitelist anyone they want to have regular correspondence with because the ISPs don't seem to be able to make blocklists more attractive.

Miss Betsy

[turetzsr]

<snip>

What concerns me is, if the level of spam continues to rise at this rate, how long before the internet becomes "clogged" with spam traffic,

<snip>

...It could be very soon or it might already have happened: see SpamCop Forum thread "spam Email now accounts for 9 out of 10 emails sent."

[rooster]

Miss Betsy;

Most of the people dealing with the spam problem do not want government intervention, IMHO (because of their personality type). It is more or less impossible to 'legislate' for the Internet because of the internationality factor.

Since we’re dealing in hypotheticals here, a major premise of which is that the spamjamming community could pull a “work stoppage†for a day or two and thereby release the floodgates for spam, the first thing to consider is what would happen if all the brakes were taken off?

I’m nowhere near being technically competent to understand this at any appreciable level of detail. But you’ve opened the itinerary and pointed to stops further down the track at political (legislative) and psychological (personality type) stations. The train also has scheduled stops at Legal Junction, Economicsville, Ethicsberg and the ever popular Philosophers’ Corners. And all these whistle-stops have bands playing “con molto tedioso†for the edification of those with an ear for it.

“Legislative impossibility†has a semblance of truth to it. Like all half-truths however, the other half is untrue; albeit unintentional.

There is a parable credited to (although unsubstantiated) Socrates in which he is alleged to have mentored a proselyte who was dunning him about the meaning of life. While taking a bath in the “Briny Oâ€, Socrates is purported to have grabbed the young Parapatete by the scruff and held his head under water until he appeared to calm down, or was losing consciousness; whatever. What the young’un absorbed from this tutorial is reported to be a deeper understanding of the meaning of life, to the extent that he no longer needed to ask the question. Rumor around “The Walk†had it that he was just scared to death to ask the old guy direct questions anymore, but he hung around because the Registrar wouldn’t refund his Residence Fee and Tuition. There was also talk about the lad’s declining attention to personal hygiene, but that is probably even less relevant.

My point is: it is wonderful to see how fast “a body†can rationalize political, ethical, philosophical, social, moral other contrived sources of angst and pseudo-piety when it is drowning.

Referring to more contemporary standards; those who have worked in or managed MBO in a professional or corporate environment will probably acknowledge consensus over the efficacy of slating “Goal Setting and Review†tête à têtes a month or so before the â€Wages & Salaries†or “Performance Evaluation & Review†rounds of discussions. It is a perennial source of wonder to behold during this round of talks the demonstrations of creative problem solving, the depth of understanding of the real issues, the level of commitment to “The Bottom Lineâ€, and the emergence of elegant solutions to problems you didn’t know existed. Cynics might say this juxtaposition of formal discussions is transparently exploitive. Well duh!

Nothing focuses attention like enlightened self-interest and nothing inspires commitment to one’s job or (funded) project than the prospect of losing it. I’ve seen the “impossible†get done, the ways and means implemented and policy re-written many times in my experience. You are correct to point out that you can’t legislate behaviour, and no law is any good if it can’t be enforced, at least to an extent that makes the effort worthwhile.

What legislation could do, hypothetically, is rationalize job descriptions and performance standards for ISP’s and MTA’s with business licenses and assets in the US. Non-compliance regarding UBS traffic could result in net blocks being rendered mordent by ARIN; both outgoing and incoming. Whether or not this heavy-handed approach would play any part in the response to the hypothetical spam avalanche & collapse is not important. What is important is that something would get done, and done PDQ. Again, since I am citing hypotheticals, perhaps even the threat of government intervention would be sufficient to cause those with the most to lose to do what is best and necessary to forstall the need for it. In short; let them figure it out: it’s their job… or should be.

The prospect that email traffic to: <joebloe[at]continentalus.com> coming from abroad could get unceremoniously dropped in the drink would motivate businesses with contacts in the US to take special care when choosing an ISP. Who knows, the more aggressive ones might even demand a contract that entitled them to damages if their ISP failed to protect their IP Blocks from getting “mordifiedâ€.

Using a medical model: if a pandemic virus hit the US, let’s say a debilitating but non-lethal one (no point killing people just to make a point, eh?), and caused loss of productivity comparable to that now caused by spammers, I don’t think it is unreasonable to assume there would be a deal of federal, state and county government involvement in dealing with the problem. People or institutions blatantly ignoring health regulations during the plague would face consequences and their protest that their freedoms were being sacrificed wouldn’t cut much ice with the general public.

Regarding the freedom of the internet from government intervention or invigilance (which I view as distinct from regulation); as far as I can tell, that is more illusion than fact. It seems to me to be based on a rather adolescent appreciation of the word “freedomâ€. No one who visits this site would think of pulling a stunt like sending bogus details of a bomb threat by email by way of a prank. Email is audited on a 1:100 to 1:10 basis, depending, and “Key†sampled at nearly 100%; not only in the US, but globally. The same is true up here north of the 49th. The difference being, I doubt our lot would know what to do with the information until someone explained it to them (in both official languages) and held “behind closed door meetings†for 8-10 months to try to figure out a way to deny it ever knew anything about it. And that’s a fact; there’s no denying it. But you never heard it from me.

Apropos legislation "regulating" the internet; i.e. who has what kind of access and at what cost, that suggests to me a set of circumstances that is more likely to come about unless something is done about spam. The resources that could be, would be, freed by a significant reduction in spam would, by definition, make the internet more accessible and operating with less overhead. The profit motive behind the "regulation biased" market differentiation/segmentation argument would be less convincing.

Switching from the hypothetical to the rhetorical: is any amount of suasion likely to have a significant effect on the volume of UBE? Has it so far? I am disposed to think it is having about as much effect as it does on the price of tea in cnoc_cn.net; and anyone who thinks it is effective needs to give their head a real good dunk.

Robert Gates was posed the question Monday during his confirmation hearings if he thought the US was winning in Iraq. He said no. Later, he qualified this out of sincere respect for the boys and girls fighting over there, by saying they have never lost a battle. The same holds true for a lot of people fighting the war against spam. Perhaps a lot of victories are being won. But, as the cliché goes, we're losing the war. If keeping government regulators out of the business is a real concern, then cleaning up the mess at hand would be a good way to keep the victories from being Pyrrhic ones.

[footnote: It's hard to inject a condign level of humility when you're mad about the subject]

[Miss Betsy]

While I would love to discuss, I just don't have the time. The Internet is truly 'free' - it runs entirely on netiquette where the rules are made by consensus and consideration for others. Miss Manners says that the way to deal with unmannerly conduct is the 'cut direct' and blocking is the Internet equivalent. Because no one can hurt you, no one can force you to do anything - that's the free part. It's your choice to work with others or not.

The other dimension of the Internet is economics. At this time, the big guys are making money selling bandwidth and spam takes up a lot of bandwidth. The little guys are saving bandwidth by blocking. As long as the end user doesn't understand how the internet works, s/he is at the mercy of the server admin who does what is best for him. Generally, (see the complaints about the necessity for plain english FAQ), server admins don't communicate well with non-technically fluent people. Therefore, there are not enough users total to make the big guys stop selling bandwidth to spammers.

Miss Betsy

[rooster]

name='Miss Betsy' date='Dec 7 2006, 04:11 AM' post='51871'

While I would love to discuss, I just don't have the time

Fair enough.

The other dimension of the Internet is economics.

I did mention "Economicsville".

[Miss Betsy]

I did mention "Economicsville".

Should have said the 'other determining factor in the continuation of spam' - not disagreeing with your 'Economicsville' just stating my 'soapbox' position without discussion.

Miss Betsy

[turetzsr]

<snip>

What concerns me is, if the level of spam continues to rise at this rate, how long before the internet becomes "clogged" with spam traffic,

<snip>

...We may already be there: see SpamCop Forum thread "Xtra blames huge spam attack for email delays."

[rooster]

...We may already be there:

It looks like, either by contrivance, or by abuse by spammers, SMTP is headed for a meltdown. I would prefer it be by the contrivance of principles of the internet community, compelling ISPs and Registrars to effect condign policy and regulations.

But, if that isn't in the cards, legislation and the unwanted "regulatory" implications that attach to it, seems pretty much inevitable. Once the plague reaches the level where legislators are taking hits from their business constituents, overview, interference and the inevitable exploitation of the internet at the federal (US) level will be it's future and there will be no turning back. The Bureaucracy ...."Ohhh, the Humanity!"

Until offending IP #s, and even netblocks, are systematically rendered mordent by backbone providers and blocked by responsible ISPs, I don't see the problem going away no matter how much spam filtering, filing, blackholing, blacklisting, bitbucketing etc., etc, & etc. is put in place. If that could be made to happen, "the cream will rise to the top", as the saying goes, and the,... the...the other stuff will get flushed away.

I am a strong and vocal proponent of SC's philosophy and practices. The degree of integrity with which it operates is exemplary in my view. I do see a problem, though. Given the current situation, given the technological resources used by spammers and hijackers, the service it provides to end-users is, to a significant extent, enabling spammers to target the very ones they are interested in; i.e. The technically inept and the gullible. SC, and all the spam filtering programs and email applications extant, in effect are winnowing the chaff for the spammers.

It doesn't seem to me that is the highest and best use of it's assets.

If we intrude a medical model for the current pestilence of spam, we see a similar problem with the long-term use of antibiotics. Strains of bugs have been, and continue to, evolve. Naturally occurring mutations, ones that are resistant to antibiotics, begin to thrive. Some of these bugs, or “superbugsâ€, such as necrotizing fasciitis and the A (H5N1) virus, now pose the threat of being uncontrollable or untreatable because existing anti-bug Rx' are becoming less and less effective either prophylactically (e.g. inoculations) or symptomatically after infection.

Spamcop, and other spam rendering agents, are confronted by 'superspammers' against which it’s treatment methods are becoming less and less effective. I do feel that SC and these other agents do, severally and collectively, have the necessary assets, but there is a need for them to be optimized to deal with current conditions.

The assets I am referring to are the db’s of spam activities, and the empirical rationalization of those db’s that vitiate the BLs vetted to subscribers. It is intuitive to keep developing and using these assets, and it is counter-intuitive to stop using them; that is, to selectively, systematically and transparently begin suspending their deployment.

Clients of ISPs, ISPs themselves, clients of Registrars complicit in spamming operations (e.g. bullet proof hosting, black hats etc.) could not do business if denied access to, or denied the benefits of, SBLs, if left to suffocate in their own excrement. In short, the “Hosts†would be left to die.

Managing subscriber lists could go a long way toward mitigating the volume of spam and changing the business plans of SMTP agents and providers.

I appreciate this is a forum and not a platform for monographs or pamphleteering. There are contractual obligations and a myriad of other considerations that have priority status in what I am ‘hypothesising’. Any direct actions, denials of service as it were, would and should be done transparently and above board. There is also the need to enlist a measure of compliance among those with the assets, resources and expertise to make such changes follow a reasonable and rational course.

The question is: do the principles of SpamCop, Spews, Spamhaus, SORBS, and people like Bill Stern (njabl), John R. Levine (CAUCE), Thor Elke (McAfee) and so on, really want to effect changes in the way the internet operates, or are they intent on deploying their estimable investments as vested interests, in vain hope of success, in spite of the current and apparent trends, …and eventually see the internet under federal legislative purview and regulation?

Some feel that to anticipate legislative action is politically naïve. Corporate America is just about done with the nonsense in internet telecommunications as it pertains to email. When Congressmen and Senators begin to feel their war chests might be adversely affected through legislative inaction and failure to give their major contributors relief from this plague, the rhetoric around government control/regulation of the internet will take an abrupt about face; ’as sure as shootin’. And ACME (American Corporate Media Establishment) will be all for it; their advertising budgets would get a significant shot in the arm for one thing. The kind of bohemian-like freedoms most internet users wax rapt about will be gone, and gone for good. That’s politics.

[rooster]

RE: Post #66 Follow up

Dave;

I have 11 more that feature the DNT or DNR and all are professed to be sent from T-Bird mailers. The use of T-Bird is unusual; although I have those 11 that I happened to notice and collect for curiosity�s sake since June 1.06. I can�t decide if the spammers are deliberately forging this, or whether the mailers just happen to be on the infected(?) computers.

I don't think I've seen any more spam from T-Bird mailers, but I happened accross one, run on Linux, submitted for look-see by Geoffrey Hyde on the spamcop.ng.

"Is it worth trying to get the "lacnic.net" provider to fix their DNS?"

http://www.spamcop.net/sc?id=z1167298659z4...af9024888f46a0z

[Miss Betsy]

Clients of ISPs, ISPs themselves, clients of Registrars complicit in spamming operations (e.g. bullet proof hosting, black hats etc.) could not do business if denied access to, or denied the benefits of, SBLs, if left to suffocate in their own excrement. In short, the “Hosts” would be left to die.

IIUC, you are under the misapprehension that the only blocklists available are ones that are publically available. Server admins can, and do, create their own blocklists. The public ones are just made public as a community service.

The kind of bohemian-like freedoms most internet users wax rapt about will be gone, and gone for good. That’s politics.

Aside from the difficulty of getting national political bodies to agree on legislation, the internet will not survive, IMHO, any restriction on its freedom. It has to be self-restricted because the very basis on which it is built is self-regulated or 'netiquette'.

What people who promote blocklists see is two internets - one where spam is rampant and one where blocking eliminates spam and trusted servers can communicate with each other - just like offline where there are neighborhoods relatively free of crime and neighborhoods where crime is rampant.

Miss Betsy

[Lking]

<snip> - just like offline where there are neighborhoods relatively free of crime and neighborhoods where crime is rampant.

Miss Betsy

And just like offline when we get tired of white bread, bland food, cookie cutter art, fern bars and the government point of view, we will venture into the more bohemian side of life.

[rooster]

Miss Betsy;

What people who promote blocklists see is two internets - one where spam is rampant and one where blocking eliminates spam and trusted servers can communicate with each other - just like offline where there are neighborhoods relatively free of crime and neighborhoods where crime is rampant.

I appreciate what you are saying and what you have said elsewhere. The problem is, taken to it’s logical extension, what you have just written becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy that the internet, as a coherent venue of free communications, is doomed. Damned if you do [use BLs] and damned if you don’t.

SC, and those who submit reports, and "fuel", and who subscribe to it’s mail services, do ‘promote’ block lists; … at least they form the basis for gating email according to prevailing statistical sampling of traffic. The kind of market differentiation/segmentation you pejoratively describe is the commercialization of SMTP, the dreaded control by commercial interests of who has what kind of access to the internet, and at what cost.

Server admins can, and do, create their own blocklists. The public ones are just made public as a community service.

The resources necessary to maintain BLs on an ad-hoc basis around the world according to your view here, would require hundreds of thousands and even millions of “admins†and home desk-toppers to maintain their own BLs. Such an added burden would pretty much dissuade a large percentage of current users from using SMTP. If what you are suggesting were true, then SC and the league of others who compile BLs, are merely providing a gratuitous service with little, or no real benefit. In business terms, such an assessment would mean there is little or no “replacement cost†involved if the service was terminated or made unavailable. I doubt you are so persuaded, or that is what you wish to convey (unless you’ve given up all hope, that is ). Nevertheless; that it the implication one could get from what you are saying.

So, the question is, what value do we ascribe to SC’s services? If its close to zero, then common sense would say write it off because it does require contributions of considerable time and resources to maintain. If you are indeed of the mind that withholding SC “community service†would have no material effect, no ability to induce suasion, then by the same formula, providing these services must have the same (no) effect and therefore maintaining them is, at worst, wasted effort, and at best uncapitalized public relations overhead (Goodwill) for Ironport.

There are substantial costs attributable to SC’s dbs. There were about 30 million spams reports submitted in November. If we arbitrarily assign 10 seconds per submission required to complete each sub, and if we say each person submitting would put a value on their time of $20/hr., we have a capitalization for the “Cost of Benefit†around $1.7 US million for the month ... (or about the monthly GDP for Manitoba in Canadian Dollars).

Same time; and to aid in making my point, if no one submitted reports, the only value remaining would be that ascribed to the data collected from SC’s own spamtraps. I can’t put a figure on that. That $1.7 million should be convertible to considerable suasion, however.

The reason I keep raising (harping on) this is that I am troubled by the tone of much of what I am reading here and in other areas. There is a strong sense of ambivalence and an equally strong defeatist attitude about the future of SMTP and the internet in general. I don’t have the technical understanding to cope with the level of detail that would be required to solve the intricacies. What I do know is that the communal resources and the collegiate expertise available today are not being used in the way necessary to mitigate the problems with SMTP internet abuse.

If we feel legislative regulation and control is unacceptable, and if we feel commercial (i.e. corporate) control is anathema, then we are left with (or at least need to consider) a collegiate model of self-governance to work toward moderation of SMTP. WRT Spamcop, if it does not or can not, wield it’s resources and assets with sufficient authority to qualify for a chair, then lets put our support somewhere else. Either SOGOTP. The criterion I am suggesting to make this decision rests upon whether or not withholding any of it’s services, selectively, would effect suasion where it can make a differences; you know, achieve a desired effect--- change untoward behaviour; and like that. If it can’t meet that criterion, then there is a real problem in justifying the time expended by those submitting reports and the costs of maintaining SC’s dbs.

I apply the same criteria to the fraternity of spam db collectors; the ‘gymnasium’ as it were. If collectively, concertedly and strategically withholding their “services†could not be used to modify anyone’s behaviour, (sp. those clearly responsible for egregious contributions to UBE traffic or transmitting ‘infected’ email) then my position is they don’t have a job; they have a gallery. What the current state of affairs is calling for is an agency that has the wherewithal to wield (it’s) assets with telling effect; not by imposing controls (blocking) because that just continues spiraling ad infinitem; but by withholding a valuable tool/service (BL) that enables others to exert control.

I’m going out on a limb here, but if my ISP were denied the services of SC and SpamAssassin and a few other such services, he would have to make some costly adjustments to his operations budget to provide the same quality of service that he does today, and he would find it difficult to compete against other ISPs in the area who did have those services. If this were not so, then I am at loss to understand why he incorporated them in the first place.

I’m not saying this to be contentious. I’m putting it that a realistic evaluation of the total assets and resources available to fight SMTP abuse is sadly wanting. Reasons for this seem to stem from the lack of necessary criteria for such an evaluation due by and large to vested (venal) interests and preoccupation with technical details. I’m suggesting a starting point for such an evaluation might be to ascribe a value to the effect of withholding a given service.

When I use the term “suasion†I hope to convey something a little less quaint than what Emily Post might resort to by way of blandishing the virtues of “netiquetteâ€. I don’t see this as a social subterfuge like hiding the spittoon behind the aspidistra in the dining room when company comes; in-laws notwithstanding.

[Miss Betsy]

I’m going out on a limb here, but if my ISP were denied the services of SC and SpamAssassin and a few other such services, he would have to make some costly adjustments to his operations budget to provide the same quality of service that he does today, and he would find it difficult to compete against other ISPs in the area who did have those services. If this were not so, then I am at loss to understand why he incorporated them in the first place.

SpamAssassin is not free, I don't believe. Neither is Brightmail and other filtering methods. the scbl is/was based on voluntary contributions - just like reporting. The nearest offline collorary, IMHO, is a Farmers Coop.

Most business server admins have their own system of blocking depending on the business. In addition, the internet is still 'free source' for many people. AVG, ZoneAlarm are free and so are some blocklists built for the people who use them, but offered 'free' to others.

It takes additional hardware to be able to block at the server level, I think, at least for server admins who have lots of 'clients'

And that's part of the 'economicsville' of the internet. One cannot connect to the internet unless you use the services of someone who is in business. If consumers had their consciousness raised, as they did by Ralph Nader and Rachel Carson, they would demand 'better blocklists' rather than 'no spam in my inbox'

Although the early blocklist builders envisioned that the ISPs who harbored spammers would be ostracized and therefore couldn't maintain their customer base, the reality is the 'two internets' system that I described earlier. There are always going to be greedy, incompetent, and criminal people. The idea is to create a 'safe' zone where emails can be exchanged freely because mail servers are 'trusted' (with checks like the scbl which sends reports when something goes wrong). Other email services have problems with spam and delayed email, etc. The main reason that this is not happening is because end users do not realize the value of blocklists.

When I use the term “suasion” I hope to convey something a little less quaint than what Emily Post might resort to by way of blandishing the virtues of “netiquette”. I don’t see this as a social subterfuge like hiding the spittoon behind the aspidistra in the dining room when company comes; in-laws notwithstanding.

Emily Post and Miss Manners understand how to make things work with etiquette. If you study them, you can understand why the internet works the way it does and why 'forcing compliance' with legislation won't work.

Miss Betsy

[lfv]

I signed up for spam Reporting a few days ago and have since then started getting WAY more spam than I had before. Actually, I only had a couple spam e-mails a week before I signed up for spam Cop. Now I get at least 10 a day and have pretty good reason to think that signing up for spam Cop was the reason (because I have heard several other people tell me that I should not have signed up and that they got spammed after signing up too). I want out. Or if this can be fixed somehow then that would be ok too. But just please can anybody make it stop?

Miderator Edit: This 'new' Topic was moved to another Forum section, merged into an existing Topic/Discussion ....

[Wazoo]

I have to be blunt ... posting this into the Forum section identified as;

SpamCop Discussion > Discussions & Observations > How to use .... Instructions, Tutorials certainly suggests some inattention to detail.

First action .... moving this new Topic to the Lounge area.

Later action .. merging this into one of the many previous Topics/Discussion on the same accusation ....

[petzl]

I signed up for spam Reporting a few days ago and have since then started getting WAY more spam than I had before.

I find exctly the opposite?

I use a hotmail account (for those emails one has to sign-up for) Reporting spammers most certainly has had them go-away

[turetzsr]

...First: welcome to the world of SpamCop!

...Second: you posted this to a Forum whose description is: "System parts & Functions not fully explained under an existing Help menu / option .... Questions still needed to be asked about How to use/do something are to be posted into that function's Forum section." Since you are not providing instructions on how to do something but instead asking how to do something, Wazoo has moved this to a more appropriate Forum ("SpamCop Lounge"). If you have any advice on how we can reword the description so that others don't have this same problem, please let us know (preferably by opening a new discussion in the SpamCop Lounge forum). Thanks!

...Third: your question has been raised may times. There indeed have been some who have taken the position that signing up for SpamCop has been the cause of their receiving more spam but no one (as far as I am aware) has been able to successfully support the position other than with anecdotal evidence. The consensus seems to be that it is a post hoc ergo propter hoc condition -- you received more spam after signing up not because you signed up but because spam is increasing generally. Once your e-mail address becomes known to spammers, you're going to get more and more spam.

...The single largest discussion on this subject is in a Forum thread called "Is it really doing any good?" (to which this post will probably be moved by Wazoo). I'd encourage you to read there.

[Wazoo]

Decided to go with this Topic, as it includes various "testing models and results" by several different folks ...

PM sent to advise of thos 'new location' ....

[lfv]

I posted in the origional location because "How to use" sounded like a winner. Sorry, I'm just not a big fan of reading the small print because it usually wastes more time than having somebody else tell you you suck for it does.

My server administrator told me that signing up for SpamCop might result in way more spam. It seemed like a pretty valid source. I'm aware that this doesn't prove anything, I'm just saying that it's better than hearing it from any other ranom person. Anyway, I'll take a look at the other stuff in this thread. Thanks for the help.

[DavidT]

My server administrator told me that signing up for SpamCop might result in way more spam. It seemed like a pretty valid source.

Sound like your "server administrator" might either be misinformed or have some sort of ax to grind.

DT

[Farelf]

Sound like your "server administrator" might either be misinformed or have some sort of ax to grind.

In support of such a possibility, note that spam is increasing at such a rate that even some nominally responsible admins are apparently finding it expedient now to massively filter inwards mail by default and to "drop" the spam and anything else caught up by default. Volumes received by the account holder are more dependent on variations in the ISP's filtering efficiency (load, new sources and tinkering coming into that factor) than on anything else in that scenario. As part of the "nominally responsible" tag, such admins also find it expedient to filter outwards mail even more stringently. When that happens, trying to report the spam that got through the filters (to SpamCop or others), or if the account holder changes the default "delete" to "label", can cause the submission to be blocked. Which leads to disputation between the admin and the SC reporter/cash-cow. Which is good reason for some nominally responsible admins to beware of SpamCop.

For one man's view of the spamiverse - Annals of Technology - Damn spam (The New Yorker's Michael Specter)

spam’s growth has been metastatic, both in raw numbers and as a percentage of all mail. In 2001, spam accounted for about five per cent of the traffic on the Internet; by 2004, that figure had risen to more than seventy per cent. This year, in some regions, it has edged above ninety per cent—more than a hundred billion unsolicited messages clogging the arterial passages of the world’s computer networks every day.

Mine has been running at well over 90% for years - until my ISP started (effectively) filtering. ALSO note that is a multi-page essay (the necessary spleen of course requiring more than a single page) read it all, there will be an examination later .

[turetzsr]

I posted in the origional location because "How to use" sounded like a winner. Sorry, I'm just not a big fan of reading the small print because it usually wastes more time than having somebody else tell you you suck for it does.

<snip>

...Telling you that you suck for doing this would, IMHO, be going a bit far. <g> At the risk of beating a dead horse, I'll just add that it might waste less of your time to ignore the small print but please consider other members of our community for whom time is wasted when you do that. Thanks! <g>

[Miss Betsy]

I posted in the origional location because "How to use" sounded like a winner. Sorry, I'm just not a big fan of reading the small print because it usually wastes more time than having somebody else tell you you suck for it does.

Caveat Emptor. Reading the fine print often prevents signing up and then wanting to back out.

My server administrator told me that signing up for SpamCop might result in way more spam. It seemed like a pretty valid source. I'm aware that this doesn't prove anything, I'm just saying that it's better than hearing it from any other ranom person. Anyway, I'll take a look at the other stuff in this thread. Thanks for the help.

It sounded to me from your first post that what you want is to get off spammers' lists - and thus not get spam. Once your email address has been picked up by the spammers (because you posted on a website, you gave it to an unscrupulous website by ordering something who, then, sold it to the spammers, have an easily guessable address that a 'dictionary' program discovered, or someone you correspond with had a correspondent who contracted a virus that gathered your email address from a FW FW), then there is nothing you can do except learn how to use filters effectively. Your spam will increase as the list your email address is on is sold to other spammers.

If you are interested in using spamcop to reduce spam in your inbox, then you must either sign up for the spamcop email service, convince your server admin to use the spamcop blocklist, or buy a program such as Mailwasher that can use the spamcop bl to filter spam. If you do choose Mailwasher, then you should not use their 'bounce' feature which turns you into a spammer by sending your spam to innocent people.

Miss Betsy

[partytildawn]

I know that it is not my imagination. Since I started reporting spam through spam COP, my daily spam has increased from about 20 messages per day to over 100 messages per day. Is this normal? It seems/feels like it is retaliation from those sending out the spam.

Moderator Edit: yet another 'new' Topic pulled from the Reporting Help Forum section, merged into this Topic .. PM sent.

[turetzsr]

I know that it is not my imagination. Since I started reporting spam through spam COP, my daily spam has increased from about 20 messages per day to over 100 messages per day. Is this normal? It seems/feels like it is retaliation from those sending out the spam.

<snip>

...It is almost certainly not your imagination. spam is increasing for pretty much everyone and so after you started reporting, your spam increased. If you had not signed up for SpamCop reporting, you undoubtedly would still have seen your spam increase. There are a couple of long threads in the SpamCop forums on just this subject that you should read -- one of them being "Is it really doing any good?."

..."spam" (all caps) is a trademark of Hormel Corporation, so please do not use it here to refer to unsolicited e-mail (spam). Please see spam and the Internet, especially the third paragraph. Thanks!